Dall Sheep Hunt in Alaska - The Best Hunt of My Life

[BAKPAKR]

Congrats on a great ram!

 

[jdf]

Congratulations. Well earned.
Great story. Thanks for sharing

 

[SC Living Outdoors]

I just realized the end of the story didn’t post. Here it is. I know it’s a long story. If you’ve taken the time to read it all I hope you’ve enjoyed it. -


We made our way down to him. I took my time because I wanted to savor the moment. You only get your first once. And who knows, maybe this will be my only one.

About 20 yards from the ram, Mike and Peter stopped and said, “Go put your hands on him,” letting me soak it all in.

He was an absolutely magnificent ram. Heavy, with one long side well past full curl and the other side broomed. We aged him at 11 or 12 years old. An absolute slammer of an Alaska ram. Bigger than I ever dreamed of taking home.

I sent out a couple of “Dead Ram!” texts to some friends and my wife. I had a small tape measure in my kill kit that weighs almost nothing, and my ram’s non-broomed side measured 37 inches on the dot.

I texted my friend and said, “Bad news. He’s not 10, he’s 11 or 12, but he’s 37” on the nose!”

We took a lot of pictures and sat down to eat some food out of our packs. I think I ate three meals sitting there looking at my ram.

We then broke him down, loaded up our packs, and started heading back toward base camp. We ended up going all the way that night, but honestly, it wasn’t that bad of a pack. It was downhill the whole way, and having that extra weight on my back was like a weight being lifted off my back in a way.

That night back at camp, we had backstrap and tenderloin over the fire. It was fantastic.

The plan was to fly out the next day, but high winds kept us grounded in camp for another day. All the guys in camp kept passing the ram around, commenting on him and counting rings.

Celebratory drinks, cigars, and pie were brought out, but I don’t drink, smoke, or eat sugar, so I just sat with the guys around the fire as they enjoyed the evening. We all relived our adventure and told stories about past hunts.

The next morning, there was a fresh skiff of snow on the tops of the mountains and lower winds. I thanked everyone and headed back to civilization. We were able to fly out without any real excitement, thankfully.

I headed straight to the Game and Fish office. When I arrived, a nice woman took my ram and told me they would inspect it and check it for legality before coming to get me to go over what they found.

A couple of minutes later, she called me in.

My ram was officially aged at 11 years old.

Everyone there commented multiple times about what a great ram it was. That was kind of them, and it made me feel great about accomplishing my goal.

Peter told me this was the most physically demanding hunt he had ever done. In total, we covered over 60 miles in eight days. I’m not sure how much elevation we climbed, but it was a lot.

This sheep hunt was everything I dreamed of and then some.

I don’t know if I’ll ever be blessed enough to have another sheep tag in my pocket, and if I don’t, that’s OK. Because for the rest of my life, I’ll have the memory of the first time I wrapped my hands around the heavy, dark horns of a big white ram.




We saw the rams again as we hiked back to camp.

 

[Brittany Chukarman]

Such a good write up I hated for it to end. Excellent pictures. I like the first one with you and the ram and that amazing background. Congrats.

 

[JCS]

Awesome and congrats

 

[Waspocrew]

Congrats on a stellar ram! Awesome write up and pics!

 

[MNHunter]

Great story, great write up and great ram! Congrats!!!

 

[gburk]

You are an inspiration, many congrats. Beautiful ram and lovely story, glad it worked out so perfectly!

but I don’t drink, smoke, or eat sugar

careful now you’re giving away your tag draw secrets

 

[CaliWoodsman]

Great story. How did you train for the hunt, and physically how difficult was it / how would you compare it to other hunts you’ve done?

 

[Big Fin]

I've been waiting (impatiently) for this story to get completed. Well worth the wait.

Congratulations on an amazing ram. You damn sure earned it.

I enjoy the pics you post that add so much additional context to the great writing style. It is very kind of you to take the time to do the story in such great detail for all of us to enjoy. Thanks for posting it here on Hunt Talk.

Hope your next dream is fulfilled with the same adventure and outcome.

 

[huntin24/7]

Amazing hunt and story! Congrats! Thanks for taking us along.

 

[wihunter12]

Congratulations on an awesome ram and hunt, thanks for sharing!

 

[thomas89]

What an awesome trip. Congrats on the ram! I definitely appreciate the quality of the photography, thanks for taking the time/effort to make such nice pictures.

 

[7mm08mo]

What an awesome ram, congratulations, thanks for taking us along. Your writing is superb. Felt like I was there and could feel the wind, and see the fog.

 

[SC Living Outdoors]

Great story. How did you train for the hunt, and physically how difficult was it / how would you compare it to other hunts you’ve done?

I try to stay in pretty good shape for my hunts. I specifically trained my legs doing squats, dead lifts, split squats and deadlifts. I climbed a lot of stairs with a weighted backpack (63lbs) 5 days a week for 27 minutes on my lunch break. It was still tough due to the sheer amount of miles covered and elevation climbed. I just didn’t want to not give it my all and that kept me pretty motivated.

 

[jrabq]

WOW, what an outstanding adventure, congrats!

And great writing!

 

[ODarrow]

Very fun read!!

 

[Jbotto]

I look forward to your hunt write ups every year. This one, I didn’t want to end but I’m glad it ended with a great ram for you and a great story for us all to enjoy. Thanks for posting here! Congrats on the whole adventure!

 

[BearFoot]

Towards the beginning of this story, I mentioned that I have a friend in Alaska who helped me do a lot of research for this trip. While I was on the trip, he would message me every day and ask how it was going. Every day, he told me to keep hunting hard and that I was going to get one.

Well, midday on day six, when he texted me, he said, “You’re going to kill a 10-year-old, 37-inch ram.”

Now, a 10-year-old, 37-inch ram anywhere is a darn good ram, but in Alaska, that’s an especially good ram. I didn’t mention this to Peter or Mike. I don’t really believe in jinxing yourself, but I’m also kind of weird about that kind of thing. It feels like I’m telling God what’s going to happen, so I just kept it to myself. I appreciated his positivity and confidence.

The night after we spotted the big ram, we spent the night in a steep mountain pass. It was a really cool spot with a green valley bottom and water close by. By the time we got camp set up, it was almost dark, and as we were eating dinner, it started to rain. We all headed to our shelters, ready to get up early and put a big hike in the next day.

As light crept into the valley the next morning, it was evident that it might be a wet day. It had rained a good portion of the night, and the clouds were low, but none of that would affect our ability to cover ground. Everyone put on their rain gear, and we headed down toward the creek that would take us to the river we had to cross.

In order to get to the creek, we had to bust our way through a lot of thick alders and down an avalanche chute made of big boulders that had been deposited down the mountain throughout years of winters.

During one of our pauses down the mountain, I asked Peter if it was OK if I shot my rifle once we got down into the creek. I had been hiking with it on my pack for six days, and I knew I had banged it a few times. I did not expect it to be off, but I also wanted a little extra confidence that comes with knowing you have an accurate rifle.

An hour and a half later, we were in the creek bed, and I got set up for a shot on a rock at 200 yards. My rifle was shooting a little low and left—not enough to cause me to miss an animal unless it was at an extreme distance, but enough to make me want to make a slight adjustment.

I adjusted the scope, and two shots later, I was dead on.

We found the raft that had been stashed in the bushes when we got to the river and made our way across, heading toward the creek that would take us up to the standalone mountain.

We made good time following the creek before cutting up into the timber and following moose trails through the timber and onto the tundra, eventually reaching a point that would allow us to glass the standalone mountain.

We arrived in the early afternoon and immediately saw a few ewes and lambs in one area of the mountain and a few rams bedded in a saddle on top, just visible through the clouds. There was not a big ram with them, but we figured that had to be the group we were after.

We were only able to see them for about 30 minutes before the low clouds rolled in, causing us to lose sight of the sheep. The clouds rolled in and out the rest of the day, but we were never able to see the top of the mountain again.

We ended up glassing for moose most of the day for something to do and saw a fair number of them down in the timber below. We also received an InReach message letting our original packer know he had a window to get out and get home based on his schedule. So now it was just Peter, Mike, and me for the remaining two days of the hunt.

The weather forecast for the next day showed the clouds were supposed to lift, with a wind that was perfect for coming up the backside of the mountain and hunting down the spine slowly.

The next morning, Peter and I were up with the sun, glassing the mountains. The clouds had lifted, even though it was overcast, and we were able to see some sheep up on the mountain, but not the group of rams. We felt they still must be up there, but were most likely tucked into a hole on the backside to stay out of the wind.

After glassing for a couple of hours that morning and eating breakfast, we headed out to get up on top of the mountain and see what we could find.

We had to cross a boggy tundra bottom before beginning our climb up the backside of the mountain. It wasn’t a particularly steep climb, but it was long and slow. The wind was blowing exactly the way it was supposed to, and we began to see animals.

As we finally got up on top, we looked down in front of us on the backside of the mountain and saw a couple of caribou bulls. One of them was pretty nice.

We continued to work our way up the mountain very slowly, peeking down into every small bowl.

As we got to about halfway up the mountain, working our way along the spine, I looked at my map and told Peter we were about three-quarters of a mile from the last place we had seen the small rams briefly the day before.

As we crested the next ridge, we saw a lone ewe slowly feeding about 150 yards below us. We dropped down out of sight and stayed still, giving her time to move out of our field of view, then continued moving along the spine.

About 100 yards farther up, Peter slowly peeked over some rocks into a steep, tight bowl below us.

He immediately dropped to the ground, causing Mike and I to follow suit. He peeked over again with his binoculars, then turned to look at us and said, “Rams.”

The three of us were above them, behind some rocks and out of sight. Peter got his spotting scope out to peek over and get a better look while I took my rifle off my pack, just in case these were the rams we were looking for.

Peter looked through his spotting scope for about a minute before turning and looking at me.

“Get your rifle.”

While he was looking with his spotting scope, I had tried to crawl up to the edge and peek over with my binoculars. However, this angle was steeper than I originally thought, and when I did not see them immediately, I backed off, not wanting to give away our position.

So I still hadn’t seen the rams.

I asked Peter, “How far are they?”

He took a quick range and said, “260.”

As soon as he said that, my confidence soared.

We moved about 10 yards down the ridge because we thought that would be a better angle and allow me to get prone for a shot. However, rocks blocked our view, so we moved back to our original location.

I extended my bipod all the way out and asked Peter which ram to shoot. Down below us was a group with multiple mature rams.

He said to me, “Second from the left. Facing left. Dark horns.”

The ram was standing up as I found him in my crosshairs.

I’d been waiting for this moment for a long time.

But my crosshairs were not steady. I was in a sitting-up position with my bipod fully extended. I wasn’t nervous. I just wasn’t steady.

I pulled my right leg up tight against my elbow in an awkward position, but more stable.

My crosshairs steadied.

Peter was in the middle of saying, “Take him when you’re rea—”

The trigger broke.

I worked the bolt as I heard Peter yell, “%#€! YEAH!!!”

I found the ram in my scope as he finished falling down.

I fell on my back with my arms extended in the air.

Finally, after years of dreaming, eight days of hunting hard, and the passing of six-plus rams that were too close to call, I had my ram.

High fives and hugs all around.

Down below us was a group of 10 rams with at least four legal rams. They all stood staring at their fallen patriarch.

It was without a doubt the ram I had glassed two days prior. The dark horns and heavy mass were a dead giveaway. One of the other rams standing there was a beautiful ram and a no-doubt shooter, but it was clear that we had killed the heaviest, oldest ram.

Caribou before finding the rams.
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Great story and fantastic photos!

 

[bayoublaster7527]

Great story. So happy for you. Wonderful pictures and storytelling. Thanks for letting us follow along!